V E R B A L I S T
A program to demonstrate English verb forms
by John and Muriel Higgins
Version 1.1 for MSDOS - August 1992
WHAT IS VERBALIST?
VERBALIST is a verb-building robot. So what? you may ask; as
English
speakers we already know how to build verbs so why get a machine to do it
for
us? The answer is that if we succeed in teaching a machine how to do
something,
we come to understand better how we do it ourselves. VERBALIST is an
attempt
to capture in a program everything an English speaker knows about forming
verbs
and verb phrases. Play with it. See if you can catch it out (as you will
sooner or
later). In the process you will be bringing to the surface all the
subconscious
knowledge you have about how this part of the English language works. It
is
often said that the best way to learn a subject is to teach it, and what
you are
doing is, in a sense, teaching the machine by making it create phrases
and seeing
if they are right.
The program started life as a demonstration tool for foreign
learners of
English who had problems with spelling past tenses. We asked learners to
browse
through it, to enter all sorts of verbs, real or nonsense, in order to
try out spelling
rules. Then they wanted to explore the weird oblique tenses and to know
if
anyone might use them; we stretched our imagination to find possible
contexts for
them.
DICTIONARY and NOTES
To make it more useful, VERBALIST then acquired a small dictionary
so that
the meanings of a verb could be displayed. As well as the meanings we
supplied
it with the irregular forms of strong verbs (like see/saw/seen) and usage
notes,
such as the fact that we say try to do when try means attempt but try
doing when
try means experiment. We put in code numbers to pick out words which
cannot
be made passive (like become or last). Then we found there was so much
likelihood of dispute that we had to distribute the dictionary program so
that
people could add their own words or amend our entries where they
disagreed
with them. The dictionary now has all the irregular verbs in English (try
to prove
us wrong), but only about 300 other verbs, including a lot of the ones
that begin
with A and B. In fact we will never be able to put in all the verbs of
English, since
people invent new ones every day. (If you don't believe this, ask
somebody where
they will be Christmassing next year. They will know what you mean even
though they have almost certainly never heard the verb to christmas
before.)
In the end we had found ourselves proving the rightness of Paul
Roberts's
dictum: "The best reason for studying grammar is that grammar is
fascinating."
REGISTERING YOUR COPY
The present version of VERBALIST is distributed free. We would like
you to
register your copy with us by writing to:
John Higgins,
14 Alma Road, Bristol BS8 2BY
Tel: (0272) 731146
to be kept informed of updates. Please tell us where you got your copy
and what
you and (if you are a teacher) your students think of the programs. Any
major
improvements made as a direct result of users' suggestions will be
acknowledged.
The program is not protected. You can run it on a floppy disk from
the A:>
prompt or copy the files to any directory on a hard disk. Start the
program by
typing VERBAL <ENTER>. The program files are as follows:
VERBAL.EXE
VERBLIST.VRB
VERBNOTE.VRB
VERBEDIT.EXE
The main program
Dictionary of verbs and meanings
Special usage notes
The dictionary editor (sorry, not very user-friendly
VERBAL.DOC
This documentation file
yet)
Anybody sending UK L.5 when they register will also be sent a disk
(please state
size) containing the latest updated set of VERBLIST.VRB and VERBNOTE.VRB
files, the QBASIC source code for VERBAL.EXE, and a version of the
program
written in Visual Basic to run under Windows 3 (if it is finished by
then).
USING VERBALIST
When you start, VERBALIST displays a verb phrase on screen, eg:
I walk.
together with a definition. The nine function keys, f1 to f9, allow you
to change
the forms. If you press f1, the present/past switch, the display turns
into:
I walked.
Also a note appears giving the rule for making walk past. If you now
press f3, the
perfect aspect switch, the screen shows the past perfect:
I had walked.
F2 switches in a modal verb (such as can or must) or the emphatic form
do. Notice
that the emphatic form is deselected as soon as you select perfect (f3)
or
continuous (f4), and it changes from do to get if you select passive
(f7). Why? Well,
you can't say *We do have finished or *She didn't be fired.
F4 is the switch for simple, continuous, and going to, and f5 and f6
will
switch in extra perfect and continuous forms only if going to has been
selected. F7
is the switch for active/passive, f8 for affirmative/negative, and f9 for
statement/question/question tag.
As soon as any form is chosen which requires a 3rd person -S, an ING
form or a past tense or past participle, a relevant rule will appear
explaining what
the program has done to inflect the verb.
If you try every possible combination of the switches, you will have
created
292 different forms of a single verb. If you combine these with all the
possible
pronoun and modal verb selections, you will have made 6132 different verb
phrases from a single verb.
THE NOTES BOX
There will be a red NOTES box visible at the start of the program
with a
message about using the function keys. This is removed as soon as a key
is
pressed. It returns if the current verb has a relevant note attached to
it. For
instance, the verbs happen and occur have notes about the types of
subject that can
be used with them, and the verbs know, understand and believe are flagged
as
statives, so that a message is displayed in the notes box if you select
continuous
(f4) with any of them. If you try to select passive with an intransitive
verb such
as arrive, you will get a warning message, and the whole verb phrase will
be
printed in red to show that it is of doubtful grammatical status.
THE MENU
The menu bar at the foot of the screen is active throughout. The
choices are
VERB PRONOUN MODAL RULES PRINT QUIT
One of the choices is highlighted, and the bottom line of the display
explains what
that option will do. You can select the highlighted option by pressing
ENTER. You
can move the highlight by pressing the space bar or the arrow keys, and
then
press ENTER when it is in the right place. Or you can just press the
initial letter of
the choice you wish to make. If you press ESCAPE, you will get the
rightmost
option on this menu or any sub-menu, which is normally the QUIT option.
VERB
Choosing the VERB option prompts you to enter a new verb. You can
enter
only one word; if you try to enter several words (eg a phrasal verb) then
you are
prompted to try again. If you press ENTER on its own, the existing verb
stays on
screen. If you enter a verb, it replaces the verb in the display box. The
program
looks up the verb in the dictionary file for its meaning and any notes or
usage
restrictions. If it finds the verb, the notes will be shown on screen
when
appropriate; if it does not, the definition line appears as `to zzzz:
unrecognised
verb'. Naturally there is nothing to stop you from entering a nonsense
verb and
seeing how the program inflects it; one can learn a lot about spelling
that way.
MODAL and PRONOUN
You can choose which modal verb to use via the bottom menu. The
item
MODAL lets you choose between can, may, shall, will or must. The pronouns
are
also selectable via the bottom menu from I, we, you, they, she, he or it.
RULES
This option brings in a sub-menu as follows:
SPELLING FUTURE PERFECT CONTINUOUS STATIVE PASSIVE TRANSITIVE
Each of these brings up a notes page. The SPELLING page shows all the
relevant
spelling rules. If an -ING form is on screen, you see all the -ING
spelling rules.
The same applies to -S endings and -ED endings. The other pages display
notes
about grammatical terms and, in the case of STATIVE and TRANSITIVE, a
list of
all the words in the dictionary of that particular type.
PRINT
This option prints the current phrase and an explanation page. You
can
choose whether to have the printout on paper via your default printer or
on an
ASCII disk file, so that you can incorporate the page into a wordprocessed
document.
FURTHER READING
You will find an authoritative presentation of the grammatical
facts and
theory about English verbs in the following:
COBUILD English Grammar (1990).
Collins
Quirk, R et al (1985). A Comprehensive Grammar of English. Longman
Leech, G (1971). Meaning and the English Verb. Longman
VERBALIST belongs to a type of program know as `exploratory' since its
main use
is simply as something to be explored. For a discussion of exploratory
programs
and their relevance in language learning, see
Higgins, John and Johns, Tim (1984). Computers in language learning.
London,
Collins ELT. Pages 70 - 74.
Higgins, John (1988). Language, learners and computers. London,
Longman.
Pages 39 - 52.
THE RULES
The following is the complete set of spelling rules which the
program uses
and reports. The order of the rules is a rough reflection of the
program's logic;
imagine them being applied in sequence until a match is made with the
base form
of the verb. Thus the final -e in CANOE will not be deleted by rule 10,
since rule
8 will already have applied, giving CANOEING. Syllables are counted by an
algorithm which alternately hunts for the next vowel or the next
consonant. This
yields the correct result in most cases, but it will be fooled by words
such as
REAPPEAR, which will be analysed as two syllables. The program treats QU
as
one consonant rather than as consonant + vowel, and distinguishes
consonantal
from syllabic Y.
S-ending rules
1: change HAVE to HAS (irregular)
2: double the last letter and add ES if the verb has less than 3
syllables and ends
in one vowel plus S or Z
3: add ES if the verb ends in S, X, Z, SH, CH, or consonant + O
4: change Y to IES if the verb ends in consonant plus Y
5: add S to verbs which do not end in S, SH, CH, consonant + Y or
consonant +
O
ING-ending rules
6: add ING if the verb is only two letters long
7: change final IE to YING
8: add ING to verbs which end in EE, OE, YE or INGE
9: reverse the last two letters and add ING if the word ends in consonant
+ RE
10: if a verb ends in E, delete it and add ING
11: add KING if the verb ends in vowel + C
12: add ING if the verb ends in two consonants or two vowels plus a
consonant
13: add ING to the verb if it ends in a vowel other than E or one of the
consonants F, H, J, Q, W, X or Y
14: add ING to verbs of three or more syllables
15: double the last letter and add ING if the verb has two syllables,
ends
consonant-vowel-consonant, and begins with a Latin prefix
16: double the last letter and add ING if the verb has one syllable and
ends
consonant-vowel-consonant
17: double the L and add ING to a two-syllable verb which ends
consonant-
vowel-L
18: add ING to a two-syllable verb ending in R, N, P or T with stress on
the first
syllable
19: double the final consonant and add ING if the verb ends consonantvowelconsonant and the last consonant is B, D, G, K, M, S, V or Z
ED-ending rules (Irregular verbs are first checked against the dictionary
loaded
from the disk file.)
20: reverse the last two letters and add ED if the word ends in consonant
+ RE
21: add D to any verb which ends in E
22: if the verb ends consonant-Y, change Y to IED
23: if the verb ends vowel-Y, add ED
24: add ED to a verb which ends with any vowel except E or with the
consonants
F, H, J, Q, W or X
25: add ED to verbs of three or more syllables
26: double the last letter and add ED if the verb has two syllables, ends
consonantvowel-consonant, and begins with a Latin prefix
27: add ED to a two-syllable verb ending in R, N, P or T with stress on
the first
syllable
28: double the R and add ED if the verb ends in R preceded by a vowel
other than
E
29: double the final consonant and add ED to a one-syllable verb which
ends
consonant-vowel plus N or T
30: add KED if the verb ends in vowel + C
31: double the L and add ED to a two-syllable verb which ends consonantvowelL
32: double the final consonant and add ED if the verb ends consonantvowelconsonant and the last consonant is B, D, G, J, K, M, P, S, V or Z
33: add ED if the verb ends in two consonants or two vowels plus a
consonant